Bibliography
John
Marenbon
Works authored
Works edited
Contributions to edited collections or authored works
Marenbon, John, “Eriugena, Aristotelian logic and the Creation”, in: Willemien Otten, and Michael I. Allen (eds), Eriugena and Creation: proceedings of the Eleventh International Conference on Eriugenian Studies, held in honor of Edouard Jeauneau, Chicago, 9–12 November 2011, Turnhout: Brepols, 2014. 349–368.
abstract:
The first part of my paper examines Eriugena’s knowledge of the tradition of Aristotelian logic. It shows that the logical works available in his time belonged mainly to a Roman tradition of material available in Latin before Boethius; especially important to Eriugena was the Categoriae Decem, a paraphrase of the Categories from the circle of Themistius which was misattributed to Augustine. He also very probably knew Porphyry’s Isagoge (in Boethius’s translation) and was influenced by it in presenting creation in terms of the hierarchy of genera and species. This topic is treated in the second part of the paper. I consider what Eriugena can mean when he understands the Hexaemeron in these dialectical terms and argue that he is referring, not to the creation of individual animals and humans, but to that of their genera and species. But for Eriugena, as a realist, once these universals are created, the essential work of creation is done. This extreme realism is a reason, I argue, for nuancing the penetrating account by Christophe Erismann of Eriugena as an ‘immanent realist’. Unlike other exponents of this Aristotelian tradition, Eriugena allows primary substances and accidents (individual things and their attributes) to be entirely swallowed up by their species and genera.
abstract:
The first part of my paper examines Eriugena’s knowledge of the tradition of Aristotelian logic. It shows that the logical works available in his time belonged mainly to a Roman tradition of material available in Latin before Boethius; especially important to Eriugena was the Categoriae Decem, a paraphrase of the Categories from the circle of Themistius which was misattributed to Augustine. He also very probably knew Porphyry’s Isagoge (in Boethius’s translation) and was influenced by it in presenting creation in terms of the hierarchy of genera and species. This topic is treated in the second part of the paper. I consider what Eriugena can mean when he understands the Hexaemeron in these dialectical terms and argue that he is referring, not to the creation of individual animals and humans, but to that of their genera and species. But for Eriugena, as a realist, once these universals are created, the essential work of creation is done. This extreme realism is a reason, I argue, for nuancing the penetrating account by Christophe Erismann of Eriugena as an ‘immanent realist’. Unlike other exponents of this Aristotelian tradition, Eriugena allows primary substances and accidents (individual things and their attributes) to be entirely swallowed up by their species and genera.
Marenbon, John, “Problems of the Categories, essence and the Universals in the work of John Scottus and Ratramnus of Corbie”, in: John Marenbon, From the circle of Alcuin to the school of Auxerre: logic, theology and philosophy in the early Middle Ages, 15, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981. 67–87.
